Conestoga is shortlisted for five 2024 Open Education Awards for Excellence, recognizing three of the college’s open education champions and two resources for their innovative contributions to the international open education community.
Conestoga is shortlisted for five 2024 Open Education Awards for Excellence, recognizing the college's commitment to open education.
Two faculty from the School of Business are finalists for the Educator Award, the Open Learning manager is shortlisted for the Catalyst Award, and two Conestoga-produced resources are finalists.
Out of 112 nominations from 28 countries, Conestoga accounts for five out of 54 finalists in the annual awards hosted by Open Education Global - a global, members-based, non-profit organization supporting the development and use of open education around the world. Open educational resources are teaching, learning and research resources that the creator allows others to use, adapt and share.
Shortlisted for the Educator Award, which honours an innovative professor whose extensive use of open course materials have been recognized for impacting student learning and influencing peers to share more openly, are Kiranjot Kaur and Fatih Yegul.
Open educational resource consultant Kimberlee Carter is a finalist for a Catalyst Award, presented to an individual actively promoting the creation and implementation of open educational resources.
Two resources are also shortlisted.
In the Open Collaboration Award, which goes to an environment that fosters the collective production of open educational resources and practices, Conestoga is shortlisted for the Open Access Teaching Case Journal. This has increased the accessibility of case research, particularly for post-secondary applied teaching and research through a collaborative approach to case development and review.
Another resource produced in collaboration with Georgian College, Building a Medical Terminology Foundation, is shortlisted for the Significant Impact OER Award, recognizing high-quality, innovative teaching and learning materials openly shared that have significantly impacted accessibility, distribution, remix, learning or social change.
The unique approach of this resource breaks down complex medical words into manageable components, transforming the daunting task of mastering medical terminology. It’s also highly adaptable, evolving to meet the diverse needs of learners through being remixed and adapted.
This resource has been viewed more than 1.7 million times on Pressbooks.
Winners will be announced September 18.
Conestoga employees called being shortlisted a tremendous honour, and pointed to the college culture that encourages collaboration and sharing to make educational materials more accessible.
“This recognition underscores the collaborative efforts of the Conestoga Open Learning Team and Conestoga Media Services in fostering an environment that champions open education,” Yegul said. “Their guidance and assistance, coupled with unwavering support from the School of Business, have been instrumental in the creation of the Open Access Teaching Case Journal (OATCJ) and my multimedia Open Educational Resource (OER), ‘Importance of Flow in Lean Thinking.’
“Conestoga’s commitment to open education not only enhances learning experiences, but also ensures that knowledge is accessible to all.”
Carter agreed, adding that the college culture fosters the development and integration of open resources.
“To me, this recognizes the great work that we are doing at Conestoga and how collaborative and student-centred we are here. Although my name is on this award, I'm just the one that shared the idea and am so thankful that there have been Conestoga supports to bring this idea to life,” Carter said.
“I can be a catalyst anywhere, but nothing will happen if there aren't supports to actually make change. From leaders who supported my secondment to making this into a full new position as an OER consultant, to faculty experts who share their knowledge, and students who co-construct knowledge with us, this is a great environment for a catalyst to thrive.”
The recognition is further encouragement to continue developing these resources.
“I feel honoured to be part of the remarkable Open Education World,” Kaur said. “It is rewarding to see that my work is reaching the intended global audience and receiving recognition. I look forward to making even greater contributions in this field.”
Find out more about open learning at Conestoga at lib.conestogac.on.ca/open-learning.